1

2
3
4 10. Heraclitus on Logos
5
6 Language, Rationality and the Real
7
8 Enrique Hülsz
9
10 Almost1 all interpreters of Heraclitus have always had a ready answer to
11 the question: “What was Heraclitus?”2 The mainstream reply assumes as
12 self-evident that he was a philosopher. In what follows I, too, will take
13 for granted that he was a philosopher, but I shall start by pointing out
14 that universal attribution of a philosophical character to Heraclitus’
15 thought does not really imply monolithic unanimity, since the term
16 “philosophy” can be (and usually is) understood quite equivocally.
17 And I would like to insist that Heraclitus (and, for that matter, all
18 other Presocratics) probably did not use the words “philosophy,” “phi-
19 losopher,” or “philosophize,” and so could not think of himself or of his
20 own activity as a thinker in these terms.3 Thus the concept of vikosov_a,
21
22
1 Agustín García Calvo’s views about the non-philosophical character of Heracli-
23 tus’s thought are among the few exceptions that I know of. See A. García
24 Calvo, Razn comffln. Edicin crtica, ordenacin, traduccin y comentario de los restos
25 del libro de Heraclito [sic] (Madrid 1985). Although Giorgio Colli, in La sapienza
26 greca, III. Eraclito (Milan 1980), sometimes seems to deny him implicitly philo-
27 sophical status because he usually calls him a sage (“un sapiente”), one can find
also in his valuable work statements like this: “La filosofia di Eraclito, per il fatto
28 che esprime la verità assoluta, può dirsi senz’ altro il k|cor” (172).
29 2 The lucid treatment of M. L. West happily puts it in just these words. See M. L.
30 West, Early Greek Philosophy and the Orient (Oxford 1971). West certainly seems
31 to credit Heraclitus with a philosophy, and I believe that he is right when he
32 affirms that physical cosmology was “not central in Heraclitus’ thought.” As
to what sort of philosophy, then, Heraclitus’ was, West interprets it (closely fol-
33 lowing K. Reinhardt, and perhaps not so far from Burnet) as having “a religious
34 end-purpose.” My drift is that Heraclitus’ philosophy lies rather in his metaphy-
35 sics, understood as a rational methodic and systematic concern with knowledge
36 and the real. See E. Hülsz Piccone, Lgos. Herclito y los orgenes de la filosofa
37 (Mexico City 2011).
3 The verb vikosov]y and words of this family are first attested in fifth-century
38 authors (notably Herodotus) but are wholly absent from all genuine Presocratic
39 fragments. The sole exception which could be pointed out is a fragment of
40 Heraclitus’ (B 35), but in all likelihood, as Marcovich shows in his H., the ref-
 282 Enrique Hülsz

1 as a regulatory hermeneutical idea, is most of the time presupposed, and

2 the validity of its attribution to Heraclitus is hardly ever fully acknowl-
3 edged and argued for. In point of fact, and even if there are good
4 grounds for doing so, when we call the Presocratics “philosophers,”
5 we are projecting retrospectively a language that was shaped at a later
6 time, mainly by Plato and Aristotle, from which everybody else took
7 it. Although there is some continuity in the shaping of the idea of phi-
8 losophy from Plato to Aristotle, there are also striking differences be-
9 tween their respective conceptions, including their historical approaches
10 to the Presocratics, particularly to Heraclitus. In Aristotle, he appears as a
11 self-contradictory thinker and writer, and as one of the vusijo_, his pe-
12 culiar monistic thesis about the !qw^ being fire. The image of Heraclitus
13 in Plato is more nuanced, less physicalistic, centered as it is on flux and
14 the unity of opposites. I therefore want to emphasize the relevance of
15 the question of the nature and the origins of philosophy for any inter-
16 pretation that chooses to see Heraclitus precisely as a philosopher.
17 In this paper I shall try briefly to articulate a general view about who
18 Heraclitus the philosopher is. My thesis is that he is both a metaphysi-
19 cian (an ontologist and epistemologist) and a moral philosopher. I shall
20 take k|cor as the center of my sketch, and against semantically reductive
21 interpretations I will argue that the full meaning of logos—a word best
22 left untranslated in the texts—involves the notions of language, knowl-
23 edge, reality and action, a complex unity pervaded by a common ration-
24 ality. I will focus first on the metaphysical dimension of logos, and sug-
25 gest that this is the ground on which Heraclitus builds his idea of man’s
26 nature (which is centered in knowledge, itself essentially connected to
27 both being and action, the ontological and the ethical dimensions). At-
28 tribution to Heraclitus of a theory on logos depends partly on whether
29 one acknowledges its ontological status, and partly on whether one ac-
30 cepts that there is semantic unity and philosophical consistency through-
31 out all documented instances of Heraclitean usage.
32
33
34
35
36
37 erence there to vikos|vour %mdqar is Clement’s, not Heraclitus’. Cf. P. Hadot,
Qu’est-ce que la philosophie antique? (Paris 1995). All references to fragments of
38 Heraclitus are made according to DK, ch. 22, although the Greek text assumed
39 is mostly that of Marcovich’s edition. Translations into English are my own,
40 unless otherwise noted.
 10. Heraclitus on Logos 283

1 Telling the Logos: Heraclitus as Metaphysician

2
3 It is remarkable that Heraclitus himself explicitly describes his own atti-
4 tude and procedure in terms which amply justify the ancient opinion
5 that the thinking he displays is philosophy indeed, even if he would
6 not actually word it like that. In the opening of his book,4 after dealing
7 with men’s lack of understanding about a logos which is always the same
8 (literally, “always this”) and by which all things happen, he offers the
9 earliest recorded description of what came to be called philosophy,
10 when he goes on to characterize his own procedure as di^cgsir, a “nar-
11 rative explanation”5 dealing with “words and deeds,” “according to na-
12 ture” (jat± v}sim6). Yet more precisely, he presents his own rational ex-
13 planation as diaiqe?m, a “dividing” of each thing and a “showing it forth”
14 (verbally7) “as it truly is” (vq\feim fjyr 5wei). What we can call his phi-
15
losophy and his method, he presents as the unfolding or telling of the
16
true and universal logos, closely linked to knowledge (explanation, anal-
17
18
19 4 For the Greek text, see below, note 12. That B 1 is the !qw^ of the book relies
20 on the authority of Aristotle and Sextus Empiricus, and is nowadays widely ac-
21 cepted. Not implausibly, many have proposed that it could have been preceded
22 by a few words like “Heraclitus of Ephesos says as follows”. It remains possible
that other preserved fragment or fragments preceded B 1 (B 50 is a recurring
23 candidate); cf. L. Tarán, “The first fragment of Heraclitus”, Illinois Classical
24 Studies, XI, 2; S. Mouraviev’s recent reconstruction (Heraclitea, IV.A, 2011)
25 conjectures a series of nine fragments before it. Some think that B 1 and at
26 least B 114 and 2 (in that order) belong together here and form a neat proem.
27 5 The Greek noun di^cgsir, meaning something like “narrative exposition” and/
or “explanation,” corresponds to the verb actually used, digceOlai (“set out in
28 detail,” “describe”; LSJ s.v.).
29 6 Heraclitus’ use of v}sir is arguably the oldest preserved within the philosophical
30 tradition (since he probably wrote earlier than Parmenides, and the term is not
31 documented in the scarce authentic fragments of Anaximander and Anaxi-
32 menes). V}sir is one of Heraclitus’ main philosophical watchwords endowed
with considerable “linguistic density,” to use Kahn’s words. Note in the passage
33 quoted from B 1 the apo koinou construction of the adverbial phrase jat± v}sim,
34 affecting all three surrounding verbs. For the three other instances of the word
35 in the fragments, see B 112, 123, and 106—the last probably not a full verbatim
36 quotation. Put in direct style, v}sir Bl]qgr "p\sgr l_a 1sti would be a mini-
37 malistic and reasonable version of the saying. See Mouraviev, H. III. 3. i-iii for
his reconstruction of B 106.
38 7 This seems to be the best sense for vq\fym in context, and one that is consistent
39 with usage at Heraclitus’ time. Cf. LSJ s. v. vq\fy, 2, “show forth,” “tell,” “de-
40 clare.”
 284 Enrique Hülsz

1 ysis and manifestation) of genuine being as v}sir.8 In fact, the formula

2 peq· v}seyr Rstoq_a, an “investigation on the nature of things,” first
3 documented in Plato,9 which became (through Aristotle) the basis of
4 the standard generic characterization of “presocratic” philosophy, is
5 likely based on Heraclitus’ actual language. Plato’s view differs from Ar-
6 istotle’s significantly in that Heraclitus is treated as a metaphysician rath-
7 er than as a “natural philosopher”10.
8 Heraclitus’ stance contrasts with the oblivious disposition of “other
9 men,” who are likened to sleepers (thus projecting back the idea of
10 awareness as a fundamental trait in Heraclitus’ own philosophical atti-
11 tude). Because of this self-awareness, a certain self-reflexivity goes
12 well with k|cor from the very start. In any case, k|cor is undeniably
13 present as an explicit topic at the starting-point or !qw^ of Heraclitus’
14
book, so it appears to be a true principle at least in a literary, and espe-
15
16
17 8 Pace H.-G. Gadamer’s opinion that v}sir carries no philosophical import yet in
Heraclitus; cf. H.-G. Gadamer, Der Anfang der Philosophie (Stuttgart 1996) 41 –
18 42 = 34 – 35 of the Enlish translation. The opposite view of the idea of v}sir as
19 an early basic metaphysical concept was, of course, defended by M. Heidegger
20 in his Einfhrung in die Metaphysik and essays “Aletheia (Heraklit, Fragment 16)”
21 and “Logos (Heraklit, fr. 50 DK)” (all in the Gesamtausgabe, Frankfurt, various
22 dates). Although Gadamer says he agrees with Kirk (in KRS), his claim misrep-
resents the latter’s own statements, which do not really back that v}sir has no
23 philosophical weight whatsoever in Heraclitus. In the better and wider treat-
24 ment of B 123, Kirk actually states that “the broad general sense of v}sir,
25 from which all specialized senses are derived, is ‘essence’ or ‘nature,’ the way
26 a thing is made, […] the way it normally behaves,” and that “the most common
27 early sense of v}sir is ‘being,’ though the idea of growth is not excluded and
may be emphasized on particular occasions.” See Kirk, H. 227 – 231,
28 esp. 229. This is a far cry from v}sir not being philosophically significant in
29 Heraclitus, even if it does not mean “Nature,” as it allegedly does in Aristotle.
30 9 Phaedo 96a7. It is crucial for getting the right sense in context not to translate as
31 “nature” tout court, but as “the nature of things.”
32 10 For Plato’s reception of Heraclitus, see T. Irwin, “Plato’s Heracliteanism,” PQ
27/106 (1977) 1 – 13; M. Adomenas (2002), “The fluctuating fortunes of Her-
33 aclitus in Plato” in A. Laks-C. Louguet (eds.), Qu’est-ce que la philosophie prsoc-
34 ratique (Villeneuve-d’Ascq 2002) 419 – 447; See also E. Hülsz Piccone, “Sócra-
35 tes y el oráculo de Delfos (una nota sobre Platón, Apologa de Scrates 20c4 –
36 23c1),” Theora 14 – 15 ( June 2003) 71 – 89, and “Anmnesis en el Menn plató-
37 nico,” Apuntes filosficos 22 (2003) 61 – 79. See id., n. 2 above, as well as id., “La
imagen de Heráclito en el Cratilo y el Teeteto de Platón,” in E. Hülsz (ed.), Nue-
38 vos ensayos sobre Herclito (Mexico City 2010) 361 – 389; and id. “Plato’s Ionian
39 Muses: Sophist 242 d-e,” in B. Bossi and T. M. Robinson (eds.), Plato’s Sophist
40 Revisited (Berlin 2012).
 10. Heraclitus on Logos 285

1 cially in a narrative, sense. It can be seen as an !qw^ in a fuller philo-

2 sophical sense, too (although not as either a “material” or an “efficient”
3 cause).
4 The Proem in Heraclitus’ book could have run something like this11:
5
[B 1] Although the logos is this always men become uncomprehending both
6
before hearing and once they have heard it. For about all things that happen
7 in accordance to this logos, they are like the unexperienced experiencing
8 words and deeds such as those I set out in detail according to nature distin-
9 guishing each thing and showing it as it truly is. But other men neglect all
10 things they do awake just as all things they are oblivious of while asleep.
11 [B 114] Those who speak with sense must strengthen themselves with that
12 which is common to all, just as the city with the law, and more strongly
13 still. For all human laws are nurtured by a single one, the divine [law].
14
For it commands all as much as it wants to, and it suffices for all and is
still left over.
15
16 [B 2] That is why one must follow what is common, but although the logos
is common, most people live as if they had a private wisdom of their own.12
17
18 Much that concerns the purpose and nature of Heraclitus’ philosophy
19 hangs on just what the word logos means here. That the meaning is a
20 rather complex one is the view most widely held among modern schol-
21
22
23
24 11 I do not claim exhaustivity here, as there could be a few other fragments com-
25 ing between B1 and B 114 (B 19 and 34 come to mind). As to the relationship
26 between B 114 and 2, I follow Marcovich and others in treating it as a single,
27 continuous whole. This would require more argument that I can give here, but
it is prima facie likely, on grounds of style (i. e. narrative, “diegematic” form) and
28 of content affinity (i. e., the num|m), that the texts go together. It is worth no-
29 ticing that Kahn’s insightful ordering does not follow this line, nor does Mour-
30 aviev’s reconstruction.
31 12 B 1: toO d³ k|cou toOd’ 1|mtor aQe_ !n}metoi c_momtai %mhqypoi ja· pq|shem C
32 !joOsai ja· !jo}samter t¹ pq_tom7 cimol]mym c±q p\mtym jat± t¹m k|com
t|mde !pe_qoisim 1o_jasi, peiq~lemoi ja· 1p]ym ja· 5qcym toio}tym, bjo_ym
33 1c½ digceOlai jat± v}sim diaiq]ym 6jastom ja· vq\fym fjyr 5wei. to»r d³
34 %kkour !mhq~pour kamh\mei bj|sa 1ceqh]mter poioOsim, fjyspeq bj|sa evdom-
35 ter 1pikamh\momtai.
36 B 114: n»m m|\ k]comtar Qswuq_feshai wqµ t` num` p\mtym, fjyspeq m|l\
37 p|kir, ja· pok» Qswuqot]qyr. tq]vomtai c±q p\mter oR !mhq~peioi m|loi rp¹
2m¹r toO he_ou7 jqate? c±q tosoOtom bj|som 1h]kei ja· 1naqje? p÷si ja· peqic_-
38 metai.
39 B 2: di¹ de? 6peshai t` <num`>, toO k|cou d’ 1|mtor numoO f~ousim oR pok-
40 ko· ¢r Qd_am 5womter vq|mgsim.
 286 Enrique Hülsz

1 ars,13 though there are some exceptions. A line of interpretation going

2 back to John Burnet keeps regularly reappearing. According to this
3 view, we would be facing an expression that does not entail any partic-
4 ularly interesting philosophical overtones, the meaning of which would
5 be fairly simple, even trivial and standard. A common element in differ-
6 ent representatives of this view is the stress laid on the exclusiveness of
7 the generic meaning of “language,” a move that usually turns out in
8 translations of logos as “Word,” “discourse,” “account,” and the like.14
9 Oddly enough, this approach does not make that great a difference in
10 the long run, for Heraclitus’ logos is not, on any interpretation, just
11 any discourse, and soon becomes by sheer weight of its own contents
12 and meaningful cross-references to other concepts and images, a (if
13 not the) fundamental epistemological standard.
14
Now, without denying that the meaning of logos includes Heracli-
15
tus’ own account or discourse, reducing it to “his Word” (with a capital
16
w, as Burnet would have had it) just will not do. It is not necessarily mis-
17
leading to insist that one must translate logos as “discourse” or “ac-
18
count,” since it is expressly stated (here and elsewhere) that logos is
19
something heard (and not understood) by “most men.” But to claim
20
that this is all logos means is, again, something else. It seems much
21
more likely that the texts themselves support quite the opposite claim,
22
and that a purely linguistic reading15 of logos will not suffice to satisfy
23
24
obvious contextual requirements.
25
The very first sentence is syntactically ambivalent, in a way that per-
26
mits or even demands that both possible constructions are kept.16 If “for-
27 ever” (aQe_) is construed with the logos “being this,” or with the “existing
28
29 13 Starting with Diels, adherents to this general view include W. Jaeger, R. Mon-
30 dolfo, M. Heidegger, O. Gigon, H. Fränkel, M. Marcovich, C. Eggers, and C.
31 H. Kahn, all in the bibliography below.
32 14 Cf., besides Burnet, M. L. West, C. Diano, T. M. Robinson, J. Barnes, and M.
Conche, all in the bibliography below.
33 15 Such as West’s (see above, n. 2, pp. 124 ff.) insistence that logos refers “to Her-
34 aclitus’ discourse and nothing else” (my italics).
35 16 As one can see, for example, in Kahn’s translation: “Although this account
36 holds forever, men ever fail to comprehend” (97). That the syntax of the first sen-
37 tence can work both ways (i. e. k|cou toOd’ 1|mtor aQe_ or aQe_ !n}metoi c_momtai
%mhqypoi ) is made clear by Aristotle’s famous complaint in the Art of rhetoric
38 (iii, 5, 1407b 11 ff.). See D. Sider, “Word order and sense in Heraclitus: Frag-
39 ment One and the river fragment,” in K. Boudouris (ed.), Ionian Philosophy
40 (Athens 1989) 363-368.
 10. Heraclitus on Logos 287

1 (or real) logos,”17 even if we take this to mean merely that “the discourse is
2 always true” (taking the expression in the weaker “veritative” sense, rath-
3 er than in the fuller and more natural predicative sense, or in the stronger
4 “existential” one), this does not by itself exclude an intended deeper
5 meaning18. In fact, the language that Heraclitus uses rather suggests the
6 eternal existence of its objective contents: if he is saying, at the very
7 least, that his own account holds true throughout, this could very well
8 be due to his implicitly attributing irrestricted ontological permanence
9 to its proper object19 (there could even be an intentional, yet subtle,
10 play between the logos “being (this) forever” (fde b k|cor 1½m aQe_) and
11 all things becoming according to it). Burnet may have been right that
12 logos should not be translated as “reason” (as a cognitive faculty), but
13 his interpretation of it as “Word” misses the objective sense, which
14
could be better conveyed by the French expression, raison d’Þtre. Logos
15
as objective rationality pertains to the formal aspect of the real, the way
16
things are and happen, the structure in all change. Seen in this light,
17
and without being named, logos is mirrored in the eternal kosmos,
18
which is an ever-living fire (B 30), kindled and quenched “in measures”
19
(l]tqa). More obliquely perhaps, logos is implied in the river statement (B
20
12), the quintessence of which is identification and opposition of “the
21
same rivers” (potalo?si to?sim aqto?sim) and ever different waters
22
(6teqa ja· 6teqa vdata). The common thought here is permanence in
23
24
change, sameness in difference, unity in plurality. All these formulae are
25
but variations that approach the same unitary and dynamic objective ra-
26
tionality.
27 If by logos Heraclitus meant only his own discourse, how is it, then,
28 that men are expected to understand it “before having listened” to it? 20
29 How could he say, not only that it “is always the same” or that it “exists
30
31
32
17 Rather than with !n}metoi c_momtai %mhqypoi , although this needs not to be
33 excluded.
34 18 Especially since Heraclitus’ careful expression mimics one Homeric formula
35 that refers to the blissful existence of the gods, heo· aQ³m 1|mter , Il. 1.290,
36 494; 21.518; 24.99; Od. 1.263, 378; 2.143; 3.147; 4.583; 5.7; 8.306, etc.
37 19 As he does in B30, where logos is likely to be implied in the measures, which
surely are as eternal as the world-order, the kosmos itself. As with v}sir, Hera-
38 clitus’ usage of j|slor is the first one attested in the history of philosophical lan-
39 guage.
40 20 So rightly argued by Kahn, H. 98.
 288 Enrique Hülsz

1 forever”21 and that “all things happen” according to it, if he did not
2 mean to point to some kind of objective cosmic principle, a single uni-
3 versal “law,” as suggested in B 114? And would not it be a bit unlikely
4 that, by calling the logos “common” (num|m, B 2), Heraclitus intended to
5 express only the universality and the formal unity of his own account,
6 but not the actual complex unity of its subject-matter? Questions like
7 these are perhaps among the reasons why Diels corrected himself trans-
8 lating “Weltgesetz,” “Law of the world” (appending this latter meaning
9 to the much simpler original “Wort”).22 In a different line, but likely
10 moved by similar reasons, Marcovich translated it as “Truth,” while
11 Kirk proposed “the formula of things.” Kahn, H. 22, interprets it as
12 being “at once the discourse of Heraclitus, the nature of language itself,
13 the structure of the psukhē and the universal principle in accordance
14 with which all things come to pass.”
15 Logos must include the generic notion of language, and specifically
16 Heraclitus’ own discoursive account as part of its surface meaning, but it
17 also must refer, as its proper object and the solid ground for true knowl-
18 edge, to the nature of things themselves, to “being” or “reality” (as the
19 text also suggest: cf. the parallel jat± t¹m k|com, jat± v}sim in B 1). It is
20 no mere coincidence that he insists that “v}sir tends to be hidden,”23
21 just as logos is said here to be, from the wits of most men. Ignorance
22 of the rationale of things themselves, omission of the ontologically
23 basic facts of logos and phusis lie behind his famous criticisms of venerable
24 poets as Homer (B 42, 56), Hesiod (B 40, 57, 106) and Archilochus (B
25 42), and representatives of Ionic Rstoq_g as Xenophanes (B 40), Pytha-
26 goras (B 40, 129) and Hecataeus (B 40). Hiddenness dialectically refers
27 precisely to what is manifest (vameq|m), and is best interpreted in an
28 “epistemological” context (rather than a purely “ontological” one).
29
30
31
32 21 As it is plain that I take aQe_ with the participle 1|mtor, my reading tends to be a
metaphysical one. If the minimalist view is prefered, the phrase would mean
33 simply that the logos as discourse “is true” [Burnet], or that it “holds through-
34 out” [West], with no ontological overtones.
35 22 Cf. Diels, Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker 1,2 (Berlin 1903, 1906) 1, ch. 12: “Für
36 dies Wort.” “Alles geschieht nach diesem Wort.” “Weltgesetz” was added in
37 Diels’ second edition of Herakleitos von Ephesos (Berlin 1909).
23 DK 22 B 123: v}sir jq}pteshai vike?. I owe to Daniel Graham the point that
38 vike? does not mean here “loves,” but (in view of the infinitive) something like
39 “it is usual for.” See his “Does nature love to hide? Heraclitus B 123 DK,” CP
40 98 (2003) 175 – 179. Compare with B 87, n. 29 below.
 10. Heraclitus on Logos 289

1 For Heraclitus, logos refers to the rational aspect of reality, to “objec-

2 tivity” (in an ontological as well as in an epistemological sense), and it is
3 thus fair to call it a principle of being. This strong objective sense is re-
4 inforced by semantic closeness of logos and metron, as shown by the ex-
5 pression letq]etai eQr t¹m aqt¹m k|com, “is measured [sc. either “earth”
6 or “sea”] in the same proportion,” in B 31b (a text in which the surface
7 meaning seems to have pushed the notion of language to a remote back-
8 ground). Metron is a key notion in the cosmic order, which is “ever-liv-
9 ing fire” (B 30). In fact, and even leaving aside the enlightening analogy
10 with the single divine law in B 114,24 a high ontological status of logos is
11 also backed by B 2, which closes the Proem by calling the ever-real logos
12 “common” or “shared” (surely by all things).25 Logos is opposed to most
13 men’s fancy, ironically refered to as a “wisdom” of sorts, which is “pri-
14 vate” or “peculiar to each” (Qd_g vq|mgsir), an oxymoron which imme-
15 diately recalls the analogical image of men as oblivious sleepers.26 So the
16 logos in the Proem presents the reader with a characterization of “human
17 life in epistemic terms,” as Kahn, H. 100 aptly puts it. The background
18 seems more metaphysical (ontological) than cosmological (in a narrow
19 physicalistic sense), and the foreground could be perceived as epistemo-
20 logical and ethical at the same time.
21 By giving expression to the notion of the rationality of the real,27
22 Heraclitus points at once to a vital unity of being and speech, word
23
24
25 24 An analogy clearly refered to and greatly appreciated by Cleanthes (perhaps so
26 much that he not only took it over but considerably enriched it) in his Hymn to
27 Zeus. Although analogy of logos and nomos is particularly visible, it is by no
means the only significant point of affinity. It is worth recalling line 21 (¦sh’
28 6ma c_cmeshai p\mtym k|com aQ³m 1|mta), which clearly takes on Heraclitus B
29 1, and supports the reading proposed here. Logos was fused with Fire and
30 Zeus in the Stoic tradition from Cleanthes on. On these questions, see A. A.
31 Long, “Heraclitus and Stoicism,” in id. (ed), Stoic Studies (Berkeley 1996)
32 35 – 57.
25 Note, besides the formula t` num` p\mtym in B 114, the echoes of k|cou toOd’
33 1|mtor aQe_ (B1), and toO k|cou d’ 1|mtor numoO (B 2) in B 80’s t¹m pºkelom
34 1ºmta numºm.
35 26 B 89 connects the sleepers with private worlds of their own. With Marcovich, I
36 fear that Plutarch, the source here, could be freely paraphrasing B 1 and 30.
37 27 I submit that the Stoic view on Heraclitus’ logos is, on the essentials, correct. I
believe that A. A. Long has got it right when he writes that “[i]t is thoroughly
38 misleading to label Heraclitus’ logos “metaphysical” and that of the Stoics moral.
39 In both systems logos is a principle of being and a principle of morality. […] In
40 calling their own active power in the universe logos the Stoics were expressing
 290 Enrique Hülsz

1 and content, and includes the ontological structure or “nature” of the

2 contents of language itself within the semantic range of logos. Heraclitus’
3 choice of words suggests that remedying men’s need for knowledge
4 should begin with a fuller understanding of their own language. To
5 say it again in Kahn’s words: “logos means not simply language but ra-
6 tional discussion, calculation, and choice: rationality as expressed in
7 speech, in thought and in action” (H. 102). Logos is simultaneously a
8 metaphysical and an anthropological principle. It is not just an accident
9 that, in what looks like a rare praise, Bias of Priene is credited with a
10 “greater” or “better” logos—usually translated as “esteem”—than “the
11 rest.”28 Nor is it trivial to state that “for a stupid man it is usual to be
12 amazed at every logos,”29 or, again, that logoi heard by Heraclitus are
13 cut off from the wise.30 Heraclitean explicit usage (in all nine fragments
14 containing the term) reveals an awareness of the tension between speech
15 and wisdom, since not every logos is in fact wise. At the same time, in-
16 telligent speech is endowed with the power of making phusis manifest.
17 Heraclitean utterance is closely shaped after the oracular Delphic model:
18 Apollo, who represents the highest standard, “says not, neither hides,
19 but gives a sign.”31 The twin themes of speaking and hearing give
20 logos a concrete texture, and develop into fuller ideas (involving much
21 more than mere perception), rich in epistemic and moral nuances:
22 “They [most men?] know not how to hear, nor to speak” (B 19),
23 and like the deaf, “though present, they are absent” (B 34). Universal
24
25 the closest affinity with Heraclitus” (above, n. 24) 51. See also Long in this vol-
26 ume.
27 28 B 39: 1m Pqi¶m, B¸ar 1c´meto b Teut²ley, ox pk´ym kºcor C t_m %kkym. It is not
at all clear who these “others” specifically are: the citizens of Priene, Greeks
28 generally, perhaps the other six sages? Approval of at least one of Bias’ moral
29 gnōmai is explicit in B 104, so it seems that, in spite of the usual meaning of
30 the Ionic expression pk´ym kºcor (= “higher esteem”), logos must include
31 what Bias himself said, and he must have suceeded in showing things as they
32 truly are.
29 B 87: bk±n %mhqypor 1p· pamt· kºc\ 1pto/shai vike?. This deals with the re-
33 ceptive aspect of the process of acquiring knowledge, implicitly contrasting
34 hearing with the more creative abilities of speaking and acting.
35 30 B 108: bjºsym kºcour Ejousa, oqde·r !vijme?tai 1r toOto ¦ste cim¾sjeim fti
36 sovºm 1sti p²mtym jewyqisl´mom. I take p²mtym as masculine and referring
37 back to bjºsym. The targets would seem to naturally include some great figures
named in other fragments, such as Homer, Hesiod, Archilochus, Hecateus,
38 Xenophanes, and Pythagoras.
39 31 B 93: b %man ox lamte?ºm 1sti t¹ 1m Dekvo?r oute k´cei oute jq¼ptei !kk± sgla¸-
40 mei.
 10. Heraclitus on Logos 291

1 presence of logos as a voice men constantly hear is implicitly paired with

2 its absence from their conscious minds: “that with which they deal con-
3 tinuously, this they differ from, and things they encounter every day
4 seem alien to them.”32
5 The universal ontological dimension of logos becomes clearer still
6 when we look at B 50:
7
Having listened, not to me, but to the logos, it is wise to say in agreement
8 (blokoce?m): all things are one33.
9
10 The first point of interest here is the distinction between Heraclitus’
11 own words and the logos men should heed. Logos is not reducible to
12 speech, not even to that which is spoken of, but suggests a voice and
13 a continous presence, perceived but unrecognized by most men (B
14 72, 17). We have in B 50 a characterization of the attitude of the intel-
15 ligent speakers (legontes) of B 114, which is opposite to that of the sleep-
16 ers. Not surprisingly, here we find that (true) wisdom lies in men speak-
17 ing together with one another and saying the same thing (blokoce?m) that
18 logos utters once and again, the oneness of all things (4m p²mta). A couple
19 of other fragments (B 41, 32) contain the expression 4m t¹ sov|m, which
20 joins immediately unity and wisdom34.
21 Heraclitus’ logos is not only a complex rational concept, but a pow-
22 erful, yet simple image, almost a metaphor. So, instead of choosing be-
23 tween “language” and “the well-ordered nature of the real” as a single
24 basic meaning, necessarily excluding one of the two, I propose we
25
26 32 B 72: è l²kista digjem_r blikoOsi (kºc\ t` t± fka dioijoOmti), to¼t\ dia-
27 v´qomtai, ja· oXr jah’ Bl´qam 1cjuqoOsi, taOta aqto?r n´ma va¸metai. Probably
not a verbatim quotation in its entirety (it is likely that the words in the paren-
28 thesis, as well as the final formula, are at best paraphrases).
29 33 B 50: oqj 1loO !kk± toO kºcou !jo¼samtar blokoce?m sovºm 1stim 4m p²mta
30 eWmai.
31 34 B 41: 4m t¹ sovºm7 1p¸stashai cm¾lgm †bt´g jubeqm/sai† p²mta di± p²mtym.
32 B 32: 6m, t¹ sov¹m loOmom, k´ceshai oqj 1h´kei ja· 1h´kei Fgm¹r emola. Both
texts seem to allude to logos, though in a very elliptical manner: in the first
33 case, through the universality and immanence of the gnomē, and through the
34 passive form legesthai, which is the object of “wants not and wants,” in the sec-
35 ond. The theme of unity is itself as intricate as that of logos. No fewer than ten
36 fragments refer explicitly to t¹ 6m: besides those already refered to, cf. B 10
37 (closely echoing B 50), and B 29, 33, 49, and 121, all of which exploit the po-
litical side of the idea of unity. Unity is typically viewed as synthesis in Hera-
38 clitus, and is expressed with the term harmoniē, used in B 51 and 54. See E.
39 Hülsz Piccone, “La unidad de la filosofía de Heráclito” Tpicos 28 (2005)
40 13 – 46.
 292 Enrique Hülsz

1 ought to keep both, and interpret Heraclitus’ logos as the language of the
2 real35: the language of objective rationality and the rationality of lan-
3 guage. Logos appears as a voice36 coming from the real itself, the voice
4 of meaningful and intelligent language, which coincides with the struc-
5 tural objective single form in things themselves and is mirrored in Her-
6 aclitus’ own carefully articulated statements.
7 Unity of all things (4m p²mta), as B 50 puts it, is a proper character-
8 ization of the content of the same logos which is called in the Proem for-
9 ever real and common or shared by all things, and which is itself a unity
10 of opposites. Heraclitean logos is, first and foremost, the universal ration-
11 ale of reality: it is a permanent, formal principle, a sort of law that pertains
12 to reality itself, conceived of and presented as a rational language. The
13 explicit notion of a community of all things through logos (and thus
14
of all men, and of all they say and do) refers to the togetherness or in-
15
tegrity of being, in itself and as presented in true language. Communion
16
of intelligent language with the intelligible nature of things is indeed the
17
suggested basis for true knowledge on the level of human action, and
18
the reason why logos is a prescriptive, and not merely a descriptive prin-
19
ciple: being and action are connected through logos as the rational lan-
20
guage of the real.
21
Heraclitus’ criticism of men’s epistemic negligence is based on his
22
attributing them a universal and natural capacity to understand37,
23
24
which is nevertheless seldom achieved: even the senses can be deceptive,
25
but only because the data they provide can be incorrectly interpreted by
26
their souls—which in turn must be seen as seat of the faculty of under-
27 standing: “Eyes and ears are bad witnesses,” he writes elsewhere, “for
28 men who have barbarian souls.”38 A barbarian soul is, of course, one
29 that does not speak the language of the real, and whose defective dis-
30 course or account is, because of its being irrational, thus “separated”
31 from “the wise” (B 108). One important point Heraclitus is making
32 here is that, for good or ill, the human soul is the natural seat for the
33
34 35 Cf. T. M. Robinson, Heraclitus. Fragments (Toronto 1991) and id., “Heraclitus
35 and logos–again,” in E. Hülsz (ed.), Nuevos ensayos sobre Herclito (Mexico City
36 2009) 93 – 102.
37 36 Cf. C. Eggers Lan, “La doctrina heraclítea del logos,” Nova Tellus 5 (1987) 11 ff.
37 With which he explicitly credits “all men” in B 113, echoed also in B 116. See
38 below nn. 51 – 52.
39 38 B 107: jajo· l²qtuqer !mhq¾poisim avhaklo· ja· §ta baqb²qour xuw±r 1wºm-
40 tym.
 10. Heraclitus on Logos 293

1 faculty of apprehending, understanding and expressing the rationality

2 and true nature of things.
3
4
5 Heraclitus on Logos and Self: Some “Ethical” Fragments
6
7 An essential link between the human39 soul and logos is focused in B 45:
8
He who travels every path would not find the boundaries of soul, [as he
9 goes]: so deep a logos does it have.40
10
11 Immediate connection between the soul and logos is apparent, a point
12 that strenghthens that rationality (and not just language) comes into
13 play here. Many interpreters have been baffled by the curious paradox
14 about the soul’s limits and its suggested virtual unlimitedness or immen-
15 sity: if Heraclitus is saying that the soul is limited, then why is it that its
16 boundaries could not be reached? And if he is saying that soul is, in
17 some sense, infinite, how are we to understand the positive reference
18 to its pe¸qata? Puzzlement is probably induced, not just by Heraclitus’
19 unmistakable paradoxical style, but also by the reader’s (understandable)
20 eagerness to find a sort of definition of the soul’s nature. But Heraclitus
21 is perhaps not concerned here (is he ever?) with solving the definitional
22 aporiai that might trouble his readers or hearers, but with making a point
23 about the presence of logos (again best interpreted as a rational principle),
24 precisely within the soul of man. He is succeeding to set down, in a short
25 string of words, the limits of the soul’s cognitive power. The soul’s na-
26 ture is not exhausted here, but is displayed in a set of other fragments. In
27 particular, B 3641 implies the soul’s mortality, and a primarily (though
28
29
30 39 Among the possible hermeneutic scenarios, I favor an anthropological one,
31 which seems the most likely. This line of interpretation is compatible with
32 more cosmological and physicalistic approaches of Heraclitus’ views on the
soul.
33 40 B 45: xuw/r pe¸qata [Q½m] oqj #m 1ne¼qoi, b p÷sam 1pipoqeuºlemor bd¹m7 ovty
34 bah»m kºcom 5wei. I assume the alternative reading to Diogenes Laertius’ text,
35 proposed by Gábor Betegh in “The limits of the soul: Heraclitus B 45 DK.
36 Its text and interpretation”, in E. Hülsz (ed.), Nuevos ensayos sobre Herclito
37 (Mexico City 2009), 391 – 414. For yet another reading see J. Mansfeld, “Her-
aclitus Fr. 22 B 45 D.– K. A Conjecture,” Elenchos 31 (2010) 117 – 122, who,
38 relying on B 18, proposes oqj 1neuq^sei instead of oqj #m 1ne¼qoio.
39 41 B 36: xuw0sim h²mator vdyq cem´shai, vdati d³ h²mator c/m cem´shai7 1j c/r d³
40 vdyq c¸metai, 2n vdator d³ xuw^. (“For souls it is death to become water, for
 294 Enrique Hülsz

1 perhaps not exclusively) cosmological context seems likely there. Al-

2 though I will not go into the matter, the allegedly Heraclitean doctrine
3 of the soul as fire does not seem to be backed by the fragments them-
4 selves (and it would be hardly useful anyway for gaining new insight
5 into the meaning of B 45). The connection with selfhood seems
6 more promising.
7 The background image seems to be an alternative description of the
8 personal experience Heraclitus alludes to in B 101: “I went in search for
9 myself”42. If identity of soul and self is assumed,43 this would then be a
10 journey one takes within one’s soul. The whole territory to be traversed
11 must be soul itself, and the imaging of the road and the unsuccessful
12 search seems to unfold at first in a spatial, horizontal dimension. As
13 the traveller surely must be the owner of a soul, the drift is that the jour-
14 ney within oneself is a cognitive reflexive experience, not to be ascribed
15 to just any soul,44 but to the intelligent one. Now, the point of this hor-
16 izontal approach is that the limits are not to be found. Is there a moral
17 lesson in here? If some prescriptive intention is present, it cannot be
18 not to search, but quite the contrary. Comparison with other themati-
19 cally akin texts on searching, as for instance B 18 (“He who does not
20 expect, will not find the unexpected, for it is hard to find and to under-
21 stand”45) and B 22 (“Those who search for gold dig much earth and find
22 little”),46 suggest that Heraclitus’ point is the difficulty, not the radical
23 impossibility, of the soul’s cognition. The ethical impact of the cogni-
24
25 water it is death to become earth. But water is born from earth, and from water,
26 soul.”)
27 42 B 101: 1difgs²lgm 1leyutºm. This was sometimes interpreted in antiquity (e. g.,
Diogenes Laertius 10.5) as meaning that Heraclitus was self-taught. But more
28 could be going on here: the traditional idea of self-knowledge is essentially
29 linked to sophrosune, which is precisely the virtue praised in B 112. The sentence
30 also mimics the delphic cm_hi saut|m. To know oneself is, of course, not just
31 psychological self-awareness, but requires being able to understand what one is
32 and is not, and so to know one’s proper place. See Julia Annas’ exploration of
Heraclitean self-knowledge in Alcibiades I, Lovers, and Charmides: “Self-knowl-
33 edge in Early Plato,” in D. O’Meara (ed.), Platonic Investigations (Washington
34 1985) 111 – 138.
35 43 A point denied by Marcovich, H. 57.: “[…] neither d_fgshai means the same as
36 cim~sjeim, nor 1leyutºm as xuw^.”
37 44 The restrictive character of the interpretation was suggested to me by Conche’s
text. Contrast with B 116, which I take to refer to self-knowledge as a universal
38 faculty, not a universal accomplishment.
39 45 B 18: 1±m lµ 5kpgtai !m´kpistom oqj 1neuq¶sei, !meneqe¼mgtom 1¹m ja· %poqom.
40 46 B 22: wqus¹m c±q oR dif¶llemoi c/m pokkµm aq¼ssousi ja· erq¸sjousim ak¸com.
 10. Heraclitus on Logos 295

1 tive search gains in clarity if the soul is to be thought of at once as the

2 object being searched for, as well as the active searching subject.
3 The final point changes the reader’s perspective once more: limits
4 are out of reach, and at the same time, are determined precisely as
5 such, because of “the deep logos” that the soul “has.” Depth of logos sug-
6 gests a “vertical”47 dimension: and even if limits are, for every person,
7 impossible to reach, logos must be at the beginning and at the end (B
8 103) 48 of every path one can take, whatever its direction (B 60: %my
9 j²ty, “up and down”),49 just as it must be both within and without.50
10 So the upshot of all this is that xuw^, in spite of its limitedness, can in
11 principle come to know of all things by virtue of the logos within (for
12 logos is, as already we have seen, universal or common to all things—
13 soul itself included). This line of interpretation is consistent with what
14
we find in other relevant fragments, which together put xuw^ in an in-
15
tensely anthropological scenario. It will be noticed that the picture I am
16
presenting amounts to a basically optimistic view, both ethically and
17
epistemologically, to which someone could object that it seems to flatly
18
contradict Heraclitus’ repeated condemnation of men’s epistemic negli-
19
gence. But this incoherence is merely apparent, and not real. For it is
20
not all men, not always, and not fatally, who are so vigorously critized
21
by Heraclitus (but merely “most men”). When he explicitly refers to
22
“all men,” what he actually says is “thinking is common to all”51 and
23
24
“all men partake in knowing themselves and being of a sound mind”52.
25
Now, from the viewpoint of this interpretive sketch of B 45, B 115
26
makes perfect sense:
27
28
29
30 47 I take the suggestion of focusing on the image of B 45 through a double view-
31 point, consisting in a horizontal axis and a vertical one, mutually complemen-
32 tary, from Marcovich’s commentary ad loc in H.
48 B 103: num¹m c±q !qwµ ja· p´qar 1p· j¼jkou.
33 49 B 60: bd¹r %my j²ty l¸a ja· ¢ut¶.
34 50 For other suggestive interpretations of B 45, see A. Lebedev, “Psychēs peirata (Il
35 termine psychē nei frammenti cosmologici di Eraclito 66 – 67 M” (17 – 26), M.
36 Ghidini Tortorelli, “Limite e circolarità in Eraclito: frr. 45 e 103 D.-K.” (27 –
37 46), and P. Rosati, “Eraclito, in ‘cammino,’ Intorno al fr. 60 D.-K.” (47 – 62),
all in M. Capasso, F. De Martino, P. Rosati (eds.), Studi di filosofia preplatonica
38 (Naples 1985).
39 51 B 113: numºm 1sti p÷si t¹ vqome?m.
40 52 B 116: !mhq¾poisi p÷si l´testi cim¾sjeim 2auto»r ja· syvqome?m.
 296 Enrique Hülsz

1 To the soul belongs a logos which increases itself.53

2
The limits of soul are out of reach, for they are unstable and changing.
3
And how could it be otherwise, since the logos on which they depend is
4
said to grow by itself ? The metaphor of growth (affecting both logos and
5
soul) must stand for the progress of an intelligent soul’s self-knowledge
6
but, at the same time, also for the soul’s ontological structure, its distinc-
7
tive nature, or v}sir. Marcovich’s philosophical objection to the authen-
8
ticity of B 115—that the notion of a changing measure is implausible in
9
Heraclitus—is not convincing: although it is true that Heraclitus’ theory
10
implies that measure is something constant, it is a bit too much to reduce
11
it to a “numerical ratio.”54 And, besides that, would it not be an argu-
12
ment in favour of authenticity that the bold idea of a permanent stan-
13
dard of change that constantly changes by itself (2aut¹m aunym) is the su-
14
preme paradox? It is tempting to connect the logos that increases itself of
15
B 115 with the sentence in B 84a, which lacks an explicit grammatical
16
subject: “it rests by changing.”55
17
Thus, both B 45 and 115 would point to the specific presence of
18
logos in the anthropological dimension: all things change according to
19
logos, but natural (non-human) change, although analogous to human
20
becoming, would not, after all, be identical with it. To derive again
21
from the originary examples, Heraclitus says that GGkior, the Sun—itself
22
an important paradigm for the rationality of change, by its being fiery
23
and “always new” (B 656)—“will not overstep his measures.”57
24
25
26 53 B 115: xuw/r 1sti kºcor 2aut¹m aunym. I cannot make the case for the authen-
27 ticity of B 115 fully here. It may be summarily laid down, however, that the
onus probandi falls rather on the side of those who deny it is genuine (the source
28 here is Stobaeus, who also provides the whole series B 108-B 119). Explicit at-
29 tribution to Socrates (by some unattentive scribe) is not an unsurmountable ob-
30 jection.
31 54 I set this apart from his other two objections, which are of a different nature. Cf.
32 Marcovich, H. 569 ff.
55 B 84a: letab²kkom !mapa¼etai, the first part of the only DK fragment transmit-
33 ted by Plotinus.
34 56 I must say that I assume a different reading of B 6, one of the “solar” fragments.
35 I propose that what Heraclitus wrote includes the expression “always new” (b
36 Fkior oq l|mom jah\peq Jq\jkeit|r vgsim, m]or 1v’ Bl]q, 1st_m, !kk’ !e· m]or). If
37 one could follow A. García Calvo’s suggestion (above, n. 1), perhaps the addi-
tion of [ja· ¢utºr] would be a fitting end. The result would be something like
38 this: “the Sun (so Heraclitus says) is not only new every day, but new always
39 [and the same].” On my view, Heraclitus could be criticizing a theory (if theory
40 it could be called) attributed independently to Xenophanes, a known target in
 10. Heraclitus on Logos 297

1 Human conduct, on the other hand, is nothing like this: by his very na-
2 ture, man is constantly overstepping his measures: ~bqir is a recurring
3 fact everywhere in human life, either in a political context, as “wanton
4 violence,”58 or in the individual’s everyday existence (as in the drunkard
5 with a wet soul in B 11759). Human unreasonableness has a place in the
6 cosmic order of Heraclitus.
7 But again, so does the possibility of true excellence, even if this will
8 be restricted to a few, the true %qistoi.60 In my view, Heraclitus is an eth-
9 ical optimist at heart, his harsh criticism of his fellow citizens61 and his
10 well-known unflattering views on men in general notwithstanding.
11 For, all things considered, those who speak with intelligence, the owners
12 of non-barbarian souls with ever-changing limits are there too, side by
13 side the unintelligent hearers. And perhaps even they can change, and
14
learn to think well, see, hear, speak and act. B 112 wraps it up neatly:
15
16 Being of a sound mind is the greatest merit and wisdom: to say what is true
17
and to act according to nature, as those who pay heed.62
18 Supreme virtue and wisdom are equated with sound thinking, which
19 consists of the unity of speech and action. As in B 1, the adverbial phrase
20 jat± v¼sim is in apo koinou construction, and can be taken as modifying
21 the three surrounding verbs (k´ceim, poie?m and the participle 1paýomtar),
22 strongly evoking the language of the proem. Heraclitus’ moral ideal is
23 thus quite philosophical, and it could be fairly characterized as an ethical
24 intellectualistic theory: moral virtue is deeply rooted in knowledge and
25 the nature of things themselves, including men. One important feature
26 of this ideal is that it seems feasible, reasonable and earthly, as is befitting
27
28 another authentic fragment (B 40). See my “Heraclitus on the sun,” in R. Pat-
29 terson, V. Karasmanis, and A. Hermann (eds.), Presocratics and Plato. A Festschrift
30 in honor of Charles H. Kahn (Las Vegas 2012) 31 – 52.
31 57 B 94: GGkior c±q oqw rpeqb¶setai l´tqa.
32 58 B 43, tr. after Kahn.
59 B 117: !mµq bjºtam lehush0, %cetai rp¹ paid¹r !m¶bou svakkºlemor, oqj
33 1paýym fjg ba¸mei, rcqµm tµm xuwµm 5wym.
34 60 That is, not the so-called “best” in B 29, but “the best” in terms of their wis-
35 dom, not their birth, the bearers of syvqome?m, “being of a sound mind,” itself
36 identified as supreme merit (!qet^) and wisdom (sov¸g) in B 112.
37 61 B 121, and implicitly, many others of which the clearest are B 29, 49 and 104.
For a different reading of oR d³ pokko· in the second clause of B 29, see Sider in
38 this volume.
39 62 B 112: syvqome?m !qetµ lec¸stg ja· sov¸g7 !kgh´a k´ceim ja· poie?m jat± v¼sim
40 1paýomtar.
 298 Enrique Hülsz

1 to the author of the famous saying: “Man’s character is his fate” (B

2 119)63. So, in symmetric contrast with the wet soul of the drunkard,
3 temporarily devoid of the most elementary functions (such as being
4 able to walk or just to stand up and having a sense of direction), Her-
5 aclitus points us to the virtues of just being sensible. In Heraclitus’ uni-
6 verse there’s also room, somewhere, for a dry soul (one endowed with a
7 divine ēthos, B 7864). This is the best, as it is the wisest. But Heraclitus
8 does not stop there. He also calls this, the best and wise soul, “a beam of
9 light.”65
10 This last and very visual image might be somehow connected with
11 the auditive image of logos through B 16:
12
How could someone be unaware of that which never sets? 66
13
14 Since this question illustrates so well the nature of logos itself, I suggest
15 that it complements Heraclitus’ implicit imperative (I mean something
16 like %joue k|cou, “listen to logos”67). “Do not”—he seems here to tell
17 us—“turn a blind eye to that which is always present.” His intended
18 point is here that we picture something like a hypersun that never
19 sets, a source of light that never fails. And what, better than logos,
20 could claim to be the ultimate foundation for intelligibility and enlight-
21 enment? The philosophical unity of Heraclitus’ logos presents, in addi-
22 tion to its diverse meanings, which we already touched upon earlier,
23 an ethical (and perhaps also a political) dimension. And, inasmuch as
24 logos includes the idea of measure and the rational and unifying relation-
25
26 63 B 119: Ghor !mhq¾p\ da¸lym. I read into this Heraclitus’ recognition of moral
27 autonomy and resposibility of the individual.
64 B 78: Ghor c±q !mhq¾peiom l³m oqj 5wei cm¾lar, he?om d³ 5wei. This I take as a
28 good example of diairesis kata phusin, which focuses on internal opposition with-
29 in (human) ēthos.
30 65 B 118: aqcµ ngqµ xuwµ sovyt²tg ja· !q¸stg The basic meaning of aqc^ is
31 “light of the sun” (LSJ s. v.). It could perhaps mean here just “a bright
32 light.” I follow Kahn in keeping Stobaeus’ text. In all fairness, it should be
said that there are alternative readings to that proposed here. Another possibility
33 would be “A dry gleam of light is the wisest and best soul,” but then what
34 might “a dry gleam of light” mean?
35 66 B 16: t¹ lµ dOmºm pote p_r %m tir k²hoi. The sentence goes well with B 17: oq
36 c±q vqom]ousi toiaOta pokko_, bj|soi 1cjuqeOsim, oqd³ lah|mter cim~sjousim,
37 2yuto?si d³ doj]ousi. (“For many men does not think straight about such
things as they come across, nor do they know after having learned them, but
38 fancy themselves they do”).
39 67 This “implicit imperative” I’ve modelled after Hesiod’s formula %joue d_jgr,
40 “heed justice” (Erga 213, cf. 275 1p\joue d_jgr ).
 10. Heraclitus on Logos 299

1 ship between things, it operates also as a sort of poetic principle. All this
2 has to do with the internal physiology of being, thought, language and
3 action in Heraclitus’ complex metaphysics. Not only is logos a funda-
4 mental metaphysical concept, but it is at the centre of Heraclitus’
5 view of man as an ethical—and a political—being.
6
7
8 Bibliography
9
10 Adomenas, Mantas.”The fluctuating fortunes of Heraclitus in Plato,” in A. Laks
11 and C. Louguet (eds.), Qu’est-ce que la philosophie prsocratique? / What is Pre-
socratic philosophy (Villeneuve-d’Ascq 2002) 419 – 447.
12
Annas, Julia. “Self-knowledge in early Plato,” in D. O’Meara (ed.), Platonic In-
13 vestigations (Washington 1985) 111 – 138.
14 Barnes, Jonathan. The Presocratic Philosophers. London 1979.
15 Betegh, Gábor. “The limits of the soul: Heraclitus B 45 DK. Its text and inter-
16 pretation”, in E. Hülsz (ed.), Nuevos ensayos sobre Herclito (Mexico City
2009), 391 – 414.
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